Don't Cry
by City of Dreams
Summary: [catsfic] Munkustrap is dead. Alonzo's takeover as protector is going... well, 'rocky' would be an understatement. Fic follows his attempts to get control of the office.
1. alonzo

Note- I don't own CATS, dorkus. Did you think I did?

This fanfic is... well, if I summarize it, it'll sound dumb. Just read it, and review it. Please, I put days of work and sleep deprivation into these words, put some thought into your review.

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**1**

It's dark, completely dark. Do you know when a minute spins out into an hour, clichéd as that sounds? When an hour becomes a year?

Just before dawn is when they say it's actually the darkest, but it isn't true. Three in the morning. I love that time.

Does a Jellicle need to be a housecat? I wondered about that for a while. I wonder what it would be like to change everything, spend my mornings in the still darkness, with maybe a humming fan above me, and the rumbling snore of a human near me, getting louder and softer like an old cat's purr, to the rhythm of its chest rising and falling. Up. Down. Up. Down.

I asked Munkustrap what it was like once. He liked his humans, and I guess they liked him. They certainly didn't object when he brought Demeter home.

Warm, he said. Warm and soft. Like being carried in a mother's womb again. He says you feel safe.

Me, I love the living dark of early morning in the Junkyard. By three am, most cats are back in their houses, listening to their humans snore, and those that aren't have better things to do than hang around an empty trash heap, most nights out of the year. By four am, it's light with cars and city and the suggestion of sunrise, and the young cats come out to play or get in trouble. So I like the time just in between.

The city immerses me, pulsing with night life. Underneath the car, I can't see the headlights as they blur by, but I can hear the roar of the cars. I can feel distant yells and music wash around me, and I'm more comfortable than I ever was. I feel like I belong to this place more than it could ever belong to me.

Not that I could explain that feeling to my friends. I'm not a deep guy, not at dawn or dusk, or in daytime when I sleep. Just now, away from everything, me and the night. Plato and Admetus are probably the definition of 'not deep'. As far as I can tell, they care about three things- queens, catnip, and queens.

Can I think less of them for that? It's certainly how I act. It is a thought I struggle with, but maybe underneath that, my friends have their own three am sanctuary where they think these thoughts, and they're afraid to tell me or each other, because we're all shallow by nature. At least, on the outside.

Three fifteen. I don't know if for sure, of course, but I've listened to the morning all my life. I can time this hour almost to the minute- at three fifteen the Pollicles start barking to the west as they stop to the east. At three fifteen the first morning pigeon sings, the last rat goes to sleep. Don't ask me why. I've been stalking him for days, from two to three, but I always give up on the hour. The way he looks at me, I'm positive he thinks I'm crazy, but I need this time to think.

There's a lot to think about now. And as the still unreal memory consumes me, I think only of how the night hasn't changed. My life is crazy, upside down, more fucked up than I could ever imagine, but the night doesn't care. It pulses on around me, not stopping, not even slowing...

I can't tell it that's comforting, or icily terrifying.

_This is the first of the flashbacks._

_It was nine am, when Jellicles go to sleep._

_The sun was up, up, up higher than ever, glaring down unforgiving on the junkyard with all the fury of August in the city._

_Cats draped themselves over the scorching metal like wet laundry on a line- lolling on cars, trash cans, and appliances, soaking up the heat and storing it in their fur for later._

_Later, later, later, they would need it later. By ten am, it was going to be colder than it had ever been for the tribe of Jellicle cats in London._

_It had all been done quietly in the night. They thought he was asleep; even _she _left him, just got up and left him, because he looked too peaceful to wake. She walked out into the junkyard, unchanged as the night, while his life spilled away quietly behind her, and her unaware._

_In the end, it was the twins who found out. No one would have checked, because he was supposed to be asleep right now. Another day would have passed, another time of blissful ignorance, before the nightmare descended._

_But that wasn't how it happened._

_Tantomile found first a black and white tom, curled up on the car hood, and had decided to tell him. Tell him everything that happened, then, in her way, let him deal with it. There were too many cats to be told, she couldn't waste time comforting one who was supposed to be able to deal, anyway._

_What would the kittens think?_

_She shook him roughly, and he lifted his head and hissed at her to go away, but she didn't stop. And something in her face made him stop and stare, and pull himself up._

_And she said it. She said it in six hard, emotionless words, not out of cruelty, but because she was saving all of her emotion inside, and she would not show it, not where people could see her._

_She said, "Munkustrap's dead. You're the protector now."_

_Then she walked on into the unchanged day, leaving a shattered life behind her._

'Is it scary?' I ask myself, 'Are you scared?' Hell, yeah. I'm supposed to cope with this. I'm supposed to be there, I'm supposed to be on watch, to comfort everyone, to protect the kittens, to guard the tribe.

(I'm not ready, I'm not ready, I'm not ready,)

I'm supposed to do that and not cry in front of the kittens, because it scares them. I can't cry in front of the grown cats, because I'm their guardian now. I can't cry in front of Plato or Admetus or even my nephews, because guys don't cry. But he's gone. And I won't let myself cry. Everlasting Cat, I won't let myself cry, because if I start, I won't ever stop.

(I'm not ready, I'm not ready, I'm not ready!)

What do I tell Demeter? Thank Bastet I don't have to tell her the news, cold, cold Tantomile took care of that. A wave of hate washes over me, and her face floats into my vision, expressionless, dead, but that white mark gives her a sick, smug smile.

Are they feline, the twins? Do they curl up and cry, actually show emotions, somewhere where we can't see them? Or do they just not give a damn what happens to anyone else?

How did Demeter react? I haven't seen her yet. I've seen others, but not many. And as I look out into the blackness of the night, I realize I don't want to see them. I don't want to come out of here.

_Three days before the big Jellicle Ball, there was no word for the activity in the junkyard. Queens buzzed around, talking, laughing, moving in patterns around the area but never keeping still. The air hummed with the question of who would ask who, and while the females would strut their stuff to the utmost, the young males just hung around nervously. After all, it was up to them to do the asking. They didn't say anything, but they thought the same thing as the queens talked about._

_It was in the air. Who had the best body? Who was the nicest? Who was going with that knockout, Bombalurina? Did she have a mate? Was the Tugger coming? Would he choose a date, or go solo as always? What about the Heaviside Lair? Who would go up? What would happen, what would a cat do, if they were chosen? What if they didn't want to go? Who would it be?_

_Munkustrap was above it all. Alonzo was trying to be._

_It wasn't easy. The last month or so had been screwed up, and his nephew's jibes about why the hell should he be the second protector hadn't helped. It was all in jest, and Alonzo tried to take it that way. He really did._

_But this was nerve wracking. He'd rather be down there, one of the tribe, stressing over who he would ask to the dance, than up here stressing over how to protect them._

_His views were slowly changing, too. He'd thought he was one of the tribe. Now he thought the tribe was his. His to protect, defend, care for, even die for._

_This was probably what having a kid was like, only worse._

"_Alonzo, are you even paying attention to me?"_

_The thoughts snapped out of the young tom's head, fleeing scattered to their separate corners. They wouldn't be back until three am, that night._

"_Alonzo, for Cat's sake! Securing the junkyard is more important than whatever it is you're staring at!"_

"_I'm not staring at anythi-" The words died in Alonzo's mouth as he realized his gaze had stopped roving the entire tribe and settled right on the flowing body of Bombalurina._

_As Munkustrap smiled with only a tint of sarcasm, Alonzo felt a very uncharacteristic heat rise in his face, like a child caught with his hand in the cookie jar- when that child actually _had_ been putting one back._

"_Sure, and I'm the Rum Tum Tugger. If you don't learn to take your job seriously, anything could happen." But it was said with a smile, just enough of one to take the sting out of the words. And to Alonzo, that was worse than a reprimand._

Three thirty in the morning and the pigeons have officially woken up. They thrum around me in an eerie chorus, like ghosts singing their own last rites. Like one ghost, very clear in my mind, singing for the last time.

(If you don't learn to take your job seriously...)

I used to strive for his approval, just because he was the leader and I wanted to be. I wanted it so bad; I never thought of what being leader was about. I never thought about not crying, and being the sensible one, and even (even, even) giving up catnip, Bast, that was hard. But a leader can't do that, and I didn't even realize that, until he started to train me.

(...anything could happen.)

Could he have picked a worse time to die? Did he fucking plan this? Maybe he's just faking. Maybe it's just a test, except he's in the ground, cold and dead, and it isn't a test.

I'm afraid. There are too many things for me to think about. What about the kittens? Everyone knows Macavity killed him

(and there was an note stuck in his mouth, like a paper white tongue. It wasn't until they took it out that the blood and bile came up all over his fur, and they realized it hadn't been natural causes by far)

everyone knows. And all I can think is, why now? Why, just as the Napoleon of Crime grows in power, just as Old Deuteronomy fades? Why before Quaxo could master his magic, and when the twins' power isn't the right kind to keep us safe?

The junkyard has never scared me more. It's asleep and I want it to stay that way, night breezes rolling through it, everyone safe in their houses, not coming out, not getting killed, because I'm their protector, and if they die, it's my fault. And I can't cry for them, just like I can't cry for Munkustrap, because they all need me to be strong. They all need me! I pound on the dirt, cold as a grave. Why can't they need someone else?

Even worse is the thought that they might not need me. They might not want me. They might just laugh me away...

Three fifty. The sky is getting lighter, and I need to go. I don't want to, god, I don't want to, I want to curl up under the car until I turn into a kitten, a baby kitten who can cry and run to his mother. And just be comforted until the tears go away. I want someone to hold me and tell me that everything will be just fine, they'll take care of it all.

I want...

"Alonzo?"

The voice jolts me, and if I wasn't so tired, so dead and scared, I would have jumped. But the voice itself is terrified, and quavering.

I don't know who can find me here. Who even knows I don't have a home to go back to? It's nothing to be ashamed of. Lots of Jellicles are really street cats. But I don't tell them, still.

"Alonzo?" Now it's scared, more so than me, but I stay hiding, cursing myself for doing this. I don't know who it is, and I don't want to. I want them to go away. Leave me alone.

I need

("I need, I need, I need," sighed Munkustrap. "Sometimes that's all I ever think. And then I see them, and I don't forget it, but it always fades away. Because they need the same things I do. And I'm their servant, really. Not their leader.")

to be comforted.

So do they.

But I'm their protector, they aren't my tribe.

It still hurts to crawl out from under the safety of the car, ten minutes before my time. A lifetime too early.

A face looks into mine, soft and scared. The eyes of the face shine, but not with happiness. Tears slick down white cheeks, and suddenly Victoria throws her arms around me, noise billowing from her in a mushroom cloud, a sob that expands until there is nothing else.

I should do something to comfort her, but I just stand there helplessly, even more terrified.

If this had happened to anyone before, she would have gone running to Munkustrap. Now I'm Munkustrap, the protector, and I'm supposed to do something. Supposed to soothe her and shush her and tell her that she's safe and everything will be all right.

But it won't. And I don't want to lie about this, not about this.

My fur is saturated, her whole body shaking with tears. The sob has broken and repeated itself like a terrible case of the hiccups, but in between attacks, she bawls. Just bawls as loud as she can.

What the hell does she want me to do? What would Munkustrap have done? I have no idea whatsoever.

Gingerly, I pat her back, but then draw my hand away as the sound escalates.

"I-" but my voice breaks, and I don't trust myself to speak, suddenly. In quick, hushed tones, I manage to say the word "Sorry", and then I just stand there, confused and miserable, until she stops crying, until her grip loosens to the point where I can breathe. Wishing she would just go away, and feeling terrible for thinking it.

_Tantomile had told the adults first, and let them tell the kittens. Demeter's tears were still wet on Tantomile's fur when she went into her own den to shed tears of her own, ones she was too proud to show in public. In there already, was her brother, and he wanted to cry, but he wouldn't, because toms didn't cry._

_As she folded up into her sadness, she remembered feeling sorry for him._

It's very carefully that I pry her off of me, and cup my hands around her shoulders. At arms' length, I hold her for a minute, thinking how she looks as if she might break, and then I let go, the sour taste of blood welling up as I bite my tongue.

"Why?"

I ask her, she doesn't ask me. And she doesn't seem to hear me, just lets increasingly quiet sobs rack her.

"Why did it have to happen like this?" I'm not talking to her, but to myself. I'm still hung up on myself. "Why should he just go?"

And then I realize she is staring at me. My throat doesn't hurt just from sadness, but from the strangled yell I hadn't realized that that last question was. And Victoria stares at me as though my mind is gone. For a moment that seems longer, I stare back, feeling five times my age, then look away quickly, a fifth my age.

And this time it's Victoria who says "Sorry." And she just walks away, probably to cry somewhere else.

I collapse against the car, not crying, thinking of all the better ways I should have handled that.

But I messed it up.

Really messed it up.

I'm not ready.

But not matter how bad that lump in my throat gets, I will not cry.

Even now, now when it's going to make me lose my mouse at any minute, a monster of a lump, a parasite in my body. Sucking away not blood, but willpower. Draining my energy and what strength I have. And there's nothing I can do about it, except try not to cry.

_Another flashback, like all the rest but worse for me._

_The alley was too small for this kitten. He was crazy, hyper, and just out of the nest, full of energy like his nephew would be, in time._

_Off the walls, off the trash cans, to the top of the Dumpster and down to the oily, filthy floor, fighting off countless dogs only he could see, the superhero of his own mind._

_He flew from the Dumpster to land, to tumble, head over heels laughing in the way children do when even pain is fun._

_And he came to a very solid stop, and fell silent like the grave._

_He looked up. Up and up, because the cat that stopped him was tall, or at least full grown. Silver and white stripes danced up and down him, and the kitten just stared, transfixed._

_Because the street cats had heard of the Jellicle tribe- no, no Macavity's street cat's, nor the wretched homeless, but ordinary cats that were better on their own, like this kitten's mother. The Jellicles, though, you didn't expect to meet them in the flesh. So he stared, until the tabby smiled._

"_Hi!" The kitten couldn't not smile back, he grinned with two rows of teeth, suddenly feeling better. They couldn't be that scary, not if they smiled._

"_Hey, kid." Just two words, and both of them would have probably went on their way and forgotten the encounter, if the tall Jellicle hadn't said "Can't talk right now."_

_Instinctively, the kid asked why not._

_The Jellicle said he was tracking down a street cat called Macavity._

_The kid asked why._

_Shifting from foot to foot, the Jellicle said Macavity was dangerous._

_The kid said something along the lines of, if he was dangerous, why was the Jellicle tracking him?_

_The Jellicle said the kid should call him Munkustrap, and said he had to protect his friends._

_The kid asked why._

When I met him, all I could ask was stupid questions. Now he's gone, and I'm back to square one.

I don't really remember my family, because he all but raised me. I'm not sure what made him take in a scruffy kitten in an alley, but he did.

And as I grew, I realized he wasn't that much older than me. And I wondered if I could be like that, too. If I could be the type that everyone looked up to.

As I watch Victoria run off, I get a sinking feeling that I can't.

It's nearly four am before I move, and the pre-dawn sky isn't streaked, as poets claim, but smeared with pale grey, the color of dirty light filtered through smoke.

The streets are coming alive again, and cars move faster as the really early humans speed to wherever they go at this hour. Occasionally, the footsteps of a runner echo down the alleys I think of as mine, and the catcalls and music of night 'businesses' fades into honest traffic.

My feet take me into a neighborhood I don't even know, one that's only vaguely familiar. Heaven and hell alone know why, or who I'm going to go visit. Maybe they'll understand. Yeah, that's what I need. I need someone who will understand why I bawl my eyes out, except that I'm not going to bawl my eyes out. I just want to talk.

To anyone.

But not cry. I can't say too many times, just to myself, that I am not going to cry. Because if I don't, I will.


	2. alonzo II

**Note-** As the fic's relationships come more into focus, I would just like to say that I assigned each cat's role and relationship to the other cats by three methods- from what I have seen the the three different CATS performances I've watched, what I think best suits them, and what will best forward the story. I've tried to keep their characters as close as possible to what they really are, but as always, your interpretation may be different than mine. I don't own CATS.

**---**

**2**

_She was asleep when his face appeared at her door, so she didn't see the drawn expression, didn't even know he had been there that morning when she stepped outside. Instead, she saw him lying by the side of the road like a ragdoll, and being herself, ran over._

_Had he fainted? That wasn't like him, and she knew him well enough. They had taken in plenty of kittens off the street, but most of them bonded with her best friend, because she was the 'nice' one. It was rare that one of the foster kits called Jellylorum 'Mom'._

_There was a pulse, because she could feel the blood pumping through the kid's neck as she picked him up. In a way, she felt bad. After all, hadn't she been the one who'd taken one look at him and said something along the lines of 'typical street trash'? He'd certainly seemed like a kitten that wouldn't amount to anything. All of his time was spent dodging work, playing, and more recently flirting with young queens, since he was now suddenly an adolescent._

_But unlike cats who have to live with their parent-figures, this kitten had retained some attachment to them, as long as they couldn't really impose any rules on him._

_His fur was covered in blood._

_He'd probably hit on the wrong tom's queen, the thought rose within Jellylorum. It wasn't the kind of thing Jenny would think, but that was okay, because she wasn't Jenny. Jenny would not have been so cynical, would have run to the junkyard for help, instead of hefting the kid over her shoulder and carrying him inside. And when he woke up, he would tell her what happened, and she would tell him what he needed to do. That had been the way of things for a long time._

_What he did, of course, was always up to him. But sometimes he didn't need the advice. Just an open ear and a cup of cocoa. Because boys were like that, weren't they?_

I stare at the house my feet have brought me to in a dull way, thinking I know the place. By now it has to be seven in the morning, and I've no idea how long that I have been walking. My paws hurt. My head hurts. Everlasting Cat help me, my throat hurts, but it hurts because my heart is transferring pain to it. I may be sick, at that.

I barely remember these red bricks, except that the last time I came here was almost five years ago, right on my fifteenth birthday. Some birthday.

I didn't know why I'd walked here then, either. Staggered, really. I had been drunk, gotten, in a fight, worse; I'd gotten in a fight with another Jellicle. It happened, but it shouldn't. It happened to everyone, but that never crossed my mind, just that I didn't want anyone to see me. I'd lost, that was the worst part.

I wasn't used to losing, then.

Now I look at the house, but the memory doesn't rush back to me. I remember it's nice inside, clean and beige. I can see that the lawn is as neat as ever, and quite obviously the same lady lives there, with the same cat. The cat I'm coming to see for no reason I understand, except that maybe she knows what to do.

And as the redness swells to fill my world, I fall thinking, 'Yes, this happened last time, too.'

My first awareness is of softness, and warmth. The smell of chocolate wafts over, and it tickles another memory, but one that is fuzzy, in my state. Yet clear or no, the memory opens my eyes to my surroundings. The walls are the color of coffee cream. That hasn't changed. Neither has the laundry basket I'm lying in- imagine a family that would keep the same laundry basket for five years!

The clothes are fresh from the dryer, and I stand up, not wanting to shed on them and get the lady of the house in trouble with her human, but also not wanting to leave the cloths that smell like soap and freshness and more. They smell like a mother and a place of security.

Eventually, I drift upstairs, looking for her, knowing in my heart where she'll be- sitting in the kitchen floor, under the table, with a dish of hot chocolate. She never picked up that I hated that drink, but what the hell. I never saw a reason to point it out to her.

There is no smile on her face when I reach her, but at least there isn't sadness, no fear, just an understanding glance before she turned briskly down to push the hot chocolate towards me.

The lump in my throat comes back, and I shake my head, once again not trusting myself to speak. I feel the overwhelming urge to call her 'Mom' like I used to, to break down here and now, but no. I won't.

I know she hasn't heard the news, but she has to have heard something, at the speed queens gossip around here. I don't want to tell her if she doesn't know what's happened, but my mouth opens anyway and a cracked, shattered voice that doesn't sound like my own spills out.

"He's dead, Jelly. Munkustrap's dead."

_Coricopat had gotten past the urge to cry, and Tantomile hadn't sobbed for very long. Maybe, he wondered, they really were attached only to each other and magic. Maybe they were cold hearted, like he had been screamed at that they were several times that day. Or maybe it was just anger._

_Much good telepathy did you, if you didn't understand people at all._

_What did they need? Did they need comfort? Did they need to feel strong, or safe? Or did they sometimes just need to sort themselves out?_

_He turned over, and then turned over again, and another time. Finally, he just stood and walked out of the den, into the glare of the day._

"...and that's what happened." I know my eyes are probably red, and I said a lot of things that I hope never pass beyond this room. Through the whole thing she sat, nodded, but never showed pity, or sympathy, except on the general subject of Munkustrap's death. She hadn't cried, but her eyes were shining and sad. Maybe she wouldn't cry. Maybe she just didn't want to cry in front of me, or anyone.

And then I almost collapse again, then and there, but I don't cry. Jelly's not someone you can cry to, because she's liable to cuff you for being a wimp. Even if your parents were killed in front of your eyes, she wouldn't let you cry for long. It seems cruel, but it helps. It helps me. And maybe everyone needs to learn when to move on.

Still, she says nothing, just looks at me, green eyes sad and curious, waiting for what I'm going to say next.

"I don't know what to do."

Again, I want to dissolve, but not in tears. I want to run all the way back to the junkyard and scream at everyone in there. I want to scream that out loud so that they can hear me in Communist China, and so that everyone knows. What do they want me to do? What do they _want_ me to do?

Her whiskers twitch, and then she speaks, and I listen, just to hear the sound of the cat I called mom once more. I listen, hoping to feel safe again, but no. I'm too old to feel safe, I'm twenty, maybe twenty one.

"Alonzo." Her eyes are clearing up, and I wonder if she will cry at all. "This is what you will do. Go back to the Junkyard, and protect the Jellicles. You shouldn't have come here, not now." She looks down, and sighs. "I'm glad you came here, but you shouldn't have. You don't need me, they need you." Fiercely, she looks up again. "You can't not know what to do anymore, Alonzo."

_Demeter hadn't stopped crying. The tears muted everything else so that when her sister touched her on the shoulder and cried with her, she didn't notice. When Bombalurina left, she cried harder, but not because of that._

_When Bomby returned, she was curled up and whimpering, and refused the food her sister had brought her._

_It had been a day._

_Surely she had to stop crying soon._

_Right?_

_Right?_

The argument is over, and of course she won. But it wasn't much of one, not like the ones we used to have.

Neither of us feels like arguing. I know in my heart she's right, and she knows I know it. But I don't know if I can do it. I don't know if I can go back there and face everyone. I'm not the cat Munkustrap was, but when I say that, she just shakes her head, looks at me, and says, "Be that cat."

Abruptly, I stand, throw my arms around her fiercely in the warmth of a hug I wanted her to give me, and that's when the lump comes back and my eyes start to tear up. I whisper "Thanks, Mom," in her ear, mainly because I needed to do that, than to thank her for that good advice that I hate. Because for an instant, she feels like my foster mother again, and me just a lost kitten. Then it's past.

I'm stronger than her now, but she pushes me off lightly with a comment like, "Oh, you," and then turns away quickly. I wish I could call her Mom again, but the flashback is faded, she's Jellylorum. Not my mother, because my mother was a street cat, and you can't get less street than her. I stand there for a minute, unsure, and she says, "You'd better get to the junkyard, Alonzo. I'll be along later."

I nod, remember she's not looking at me, and mumble something then leave, not sure if I feel better or worse. But as I step out of the room, I hear a sob, followed by the silence I've become familiar with- that of someone determinedly not crying.

Maybe she should be the protector.

_The second person Tantomile told that day was the Rum Tum Tugger._

_He was angry. Dead angry._

_His little brother was dead._

_Gone were countless arguments, hundreds of feuds and pranks and even the fact that they were both grown cats, now. Munkustrap was the chubby little kitten that used to wake up with nightmares as late as noon, the Tugger's kid brother. _His_ brother._

_Not that that bitch cared, just told him and walked away, away to go get on with her stupid witchy life._

_He probably screamed something at her, but his memory was a little faded. Red was in his eyes as veins exploded, and he had to sit down, but he remembered saying one thing over and over. He was going to get that ass, Macavity. If it was the last thing he did._

_It didn't matter who or what was in his way, because his little brother was dead, because of that... that..._

_A scream of grief tore itself from his throat, and that was it. No tears, no pain, just anger, because it was time someone taught that bastard that meaning of fear._

"_Macavity." The name hissed easily between Tugger's teeth, "Macavity. You're going to regret this. You're going to regret the day you were born into this family. And you're going to curse the day I was." He might have yelled, but it was so much more satisfying, so much more threatening, to do it this way._

_He wasn't a fighter by nature. He was a rock star._

_What could he do? How could he get that bastard to a position where Tugger had the advantage?_

_Yes. No. Then he smiled grimly as a flash of striped orange fur passed. Yes._

"_You're going to pay, Big Mac."_

The junkyard still scares me. I feel much better standing outside it, hovering outside it, because I don't want to go inside. The tears are still caking in my throat, and I don't want to talk to anyone, but I have to. I have to do a thousand things, the first of which

(The note.)

I don't remember. Something to do with the way, the way he was found. Something...

Bast. I don't like this, I really don't.

_Now the flashbacks end. The thinking ends, for now, and it's time to live._

_A black and white cat, not a kitten any longer, hovers outside the junkyard. He's not heavily built, actually perhaps an inch below average height and rather slender. Many queens have considered him attractive in the past, but there is not risk of that today. Today his eyes are bloodshot and they glisten with tears that want to fall. His stance makes him look afraid, and he is._

_He is afraid and scared and wants nothing more than to run, run far away._

_He walks inside._

The junkyard is a Bast-forsaken mess.

I know who I want to see first, but the most important thing is who I need to see, first, right? I hope so. I really do.

It's getting so hard to think, and I can't close my eyes. I see the blood mixed with his stomach contents pouring from his mouth, all over his fur, as if that was his final reflex, to vomit with his eyes closed and then die.

My hackles raise, and I hold back a shudder, or try, without success. It comes again, and again, and suddenly I am on the floor again, collapsed against a tire, my eyes closing once more, but it feels good, because now for no reason, I really, really, need nothing more than sleep.

And then? I am standing once more, my legs shaking as I walk on inwards, with no idea what to do or even expect, still with the pain in my throat as hundreds of unshed tears become a malignant tumor of sorrow.

_Tantomile watches him walk in with her arms around the dark queen Cassandra, and her lip curls only a little._

_She had hoped he wouldn't come back, after he ran away like that, on one side, on the other she had prayed he might show a bit of backbone. But not this. Slinking into the junkyard like it could kill him to be strong, as if he expected it to protect him, now._

_And poor Cassandra._

_Could he have had any idea what the dark queen felt? What would he think if he saw her now, curled up and racked not by tears (though everyone in their way grieved for Munkustrap, some knew him far less personally) but by fear. Fear of what was coming, without a protector._

_Tantomile had actually thought that the little worm was going away for good._

_But it was worse than that._

_At first, Cassandra smiled, said Alonzo would handle it, he could handle it, they would be safe._

_She had faith in that selfish bastard, and he ran away. Ran away and left the junkyard terrified, and his own mate scared not for herself but for him, thinking whatever had gotten Munkustrap had gotten him. And now he has the nerve to come slinking back in like a beaten weasel, and she wonders where their 'protector' has been while the people with _feelings_ mourned._

_Tantomile bites back a snarl and turns it into a smile. Conflict can come later. Just now, there has to be peace, for her friend's sake._

"_Look," standing, she lays a paw on the Burmese's head, and gently tilts her face upwards, towards the tom who sure as the fell had better make her feel better. "He's back."_

I try to pretend I'm still talking to Jelly, in that sand colored soft house, where I can be brave. But the first cat to come up to me ruins that charade.

"Where the hell have you been?" Her voice is a screech, her normally beautiful face is in tatters, no makeup on, her hair undone, and she stands before me, a picture of anger.

Some queens look wildly beautiful in moments like these, but Bombalurina sends chills up my spine. She looks rabid.

For the first time in my life, I genuinely have no idea what to say.

"Do you think you can just waltz away from us now? Do you? My sister," her face draws close to mine, an incensed snake hiss shredding from it, "isn't eating. The kittens are in tears. Jennyanydots is in tears, and so is Skimbleshanks, and even more of the kittens start crying because they're crying!"

The hardest thing of my life

(has everything lately been the hardest thing of my life?)

is to not flinch away from her, to try to take a collected step backwards.

"Half of the population of the Junkyard is terrified, and..." the rage still in her eyes, she draws back her fist, and suddenly I'm on the floor with hot blood spurting from my nose, and no idea how it happened so fast, only the idea of the pain like a red hot poker sizzling into the masses of sadness, and my stomach turns.

No tears. No tears. No tears! Biting into my tongue until it bleeds, I suddenly feel something horrible, starting in my throat, something that isn't a sob.

The tingle of illness and sour bile roils up my throat and over my tongue, forcing my mouth open and anything I've had to eat in the last few hours through my burning mouth into a stinking puddle on the ground.

Bombalurina is standing over me now, and I am clutching my stomach and trying to keep from both crying

(he's dead, he's dead)

and screaming

(why did you do that?)

or rolling into my own vomit.

In the end, I stand, and she hasn't moved, but her face is softer, a little bit softer.

Bombalurina doesn't apologize, and she will stand by what she just did. Her face almost looks glad that she did it to me, a bit less stressed, a little more normal.

I try to speak and choke, try, choke. For a minute, I'm afraid I won't be able to say anything at all, but I finally manage, in the same tired, defeated voice I spoke to Jelly in, I manage to say, "Don't take out your anger on me, Bomby." We're friends, or I thought we were. Are we? I have no idea any more. "It's not my fault any more than it's your fault..." I start to say, 'and I'm only feline, like you,' but stop, sigh, and walk away.

_She watches him go with mixed feelings. He deserved that punch; he deserved to roll in his own puke like an animal. He was supposed to be their leader now! Munkustrap had chosen him because-_

_Munkustrap._

_Bombalurina turns her head towards the oven, where her sister has taken her first bites of food. Maybe she's too angry. Maybe she just needs to think this through._

_Who was closer to Munkustrap than Demeter? Answer- no one. No one felt this like her sister, her sister who was practically married to the tom. Had been._

_Right?_

_Bast, she hated moments of uncertainty. What did she know about Alonzo? Not much, for someone she was friends with. He was just another kitten taken in off of the streets. One that Munkustrap had taken under his wing, because when the tom was only twenty, he wanted someone to be his younger brother..._

_He never cared about that stuff, though. He was just like all of the other toms his age, running off at a sign of danger, interested only in females and drugs._

_Everyone knew that._

There is only one person that I dare to go see, and I can only pray that I can face her.

Frankly, I'd rather get punched by Bomby again, because who knows what she will think of me.

But I need to cry. I can feel it still, consuming my entire body with a tingling ache, my breaths more like sobs than anything else. If I don't, it will swallow me, keep me running, and I will never be the leader I need to be.

One good cry, and it will all be over. I don't need to worry about it again, and no one needs to know. No one will know, though, because I won't do it.

Because toms don't cry, for Everlasting Cat's sake. We can't.


	3. cassandra I

**Note-** I don't own CATS.

This part caused me major sleep deprivation as the story started to grow in ways I didn't want it to. Bah. Never try to control your story. It gets nasty when it fights back.

**-----**

**3 (cassandra)**

"Alonzo?"

The sadness in my voice surprises me.

"Alonzo?"

Why doesn't he talk? It is a little bit scary, or it would be if he was looking at me, but he just leans stiffly against the tire, staring at the sliver of moon. Hard to believe it's only been a month since the Ball, since everything was going well. Now its light is pale and thin, and it shines unfavorably on his red eyes and unshed tears.

"It's not true, Alonzo, is it? Tantomile says you tried to run away."

It's important to me to know. I'd never have asked something like that before, just blindly assumed he couldn't and wouldn't lie to me, but yesterday, today, a lot of assumptions were being shattered. In the best of times, cats are not social creatures, and now there were dreadful rumors of the Jellicles dissolving or worse.

Abruptly, I need to know the truth, and I need it to be no, he was on some legitimate business. I need him to stand up strong and be the tom I always dated, not this scared, sad shell.

But he sags, and looks above me with one of his tired, haunted pupils. I wish that look would leave his eye. I suppose it will, in time.

"Almost, Cass. But I didn't." God, he sounds wrung out and shredded, like he'd been pulled apart at the seams and not stitched back together. He staggers a little, and I don't resist the instinct to draw him to me, but he flinches away.

He doesn't seem to want to touch me. I'm not sure I want to touch him.

"Who did that to you?" I point at blood caked below his nose in an effort to change the subject.

"Bombalurina." He's swaying, a little, and the focus is bleeding out of his eyes as they cross and uncross.

"Are you okay?" It's the single stupidest thing I could say, I guess. He doesn't respond, anyway, and I stand and stare at him for a moment, trying to put this creature together with the Alonzo I last saw before- well, before the news. My eyes refuse bodily to move away, and my mouth refuses to open. There are so many things I want to say, but suddenly it's too late, because he's falling, and I don't even move to catch him. I just watch him slide down and pass out like a drunk on the ground, and then I force my eyes shut, and try to think about something else.

(It is over, isn't it? Tell me it's over, it's gotta be!)

Maybe he'll get the hang of the job. Maybe all he needs is some help. Or maybe

(don't think that, don't think that)

maybe-

Never mind.

He's not very heavy, and it feels like he hasn't eaten in the past two days. Fell, I can feel his ribs wooden slats. I'm dragging him in a very squeamish way, because I don't want blood or mud or any of the stuff all over his fur on me.

I don't like the idea of seeing him like this for the next who-knows-how long. It's killing him, and it's only been two days. I'm still not sure why it hit him so hard

(How well did he know the old leader? Munkustrak, or trap, or whatever.)

but it did, almost as bad as Demeter, or the Tugger. Come to think of it, no one's seen Munky's brother since the murder.

I shrug these thoughts from my mind, but too quickly they are replaced by fear. Horrible, icy fear for the junkyard, Demeter, for our safety, and mostly for me and for the broken cat I'm dragging to my den as I think.

They can have him later. He needs me now, and I need him.

_The Tugger grinned sickly as the flash of orange fur faded away. It had been the wrong orange, but that changed nothing._

_He knew exactly what to do now; he knew how to get back at the bastard._

_They had probably helped him, anyway. Everyone knew they had helped him. He was everyone, and if anyone else didn't think so, they were wrong!_

_Claws biting into his hands, he exerted all of his willpower to remain seated. The pain was unnoticed, just more fuel to the fires of his anger._

_There was time enough to do this right. He just had to keep the throbbing beast of his feelings inside for now, to plan it out. The adrenaline, the fury so cold if made his spine numb, the shear claw shredding need to kill, could beat futile against bars of reason until it was time to let them out._

_A smile spread over his face, so normal, so happy, that it would have sent chills down the spine of the late Munkustrap, who knew what it meant._

_Unclenching one paw with painful effort, he raised it to his face and began to lick the warm blood off._

_It was almost time. He had a plan, now._

He doesn't wake up, so I leave him to sleep off whatever he needs to in house my owners bought me, a rich blue affair with pillows tossed over the floor. Satin. I'm proud of them, and he's spreading mud and who knows what else on them, but I'll overlook it for now. Curled up like a kitten in them, he looks so at peace that I don't want to disturb him, so I leave him there to get my bedding filthy, and go off to find something to do.

There isn't much. The house is kept tidy by my humans (who would kill me if they saw I brought another cat home) and their maid, and I don't have many possessions of my own. A hint of catnip, here and there, but now isn't the time for that. Tomorrow, maybe. I'll need it then.

I'm not so sad that Munkustrap is dead as the others are. I feel oddly at peace with it, possibly because I didn't even know him. I mean, it sounds stupid. He is- was- the leader.

The saddening thing is that he died, and the chilling thing is that he was murdered. You know what they say- about the note- what it said.

Why would someone do that? Even Macavity? How could something like that happen to one of us?

I don't know.

This room offers no answers, only raises more questions. It's my humans' prayer room, and it's where I come to think, because it's easy to lose myself in it.

Misty gray walls confine it, but they seem to be less of a boundary then of a window, looking out from here, into the mysterious fogs of infinity. In the room, I feel quite small, but large at the same time. I feel like I can see everything, falling gently into place. Coarse and puffy beneath my feet, the blackness seems less of a carpet than a cloud.

There is not a single window in this room. Nor is there a light.

It makes its own light, deep in my soul, glowing happily and comfortably, so that I see clearest in here, through the floating lines of pungent incense smoke.

Lining the walls are statues.

Beautiful statues.

They are ancient (my humans paid thousands for them) and white, like marble or bone. Their proud gazes don't ever waver or stray from each other, never do they look down at me with stone eyes. They just stare into space, gleaming silently in the darkness.

I wonder what these things have seen.

I wonder if I know as much as I always thought I do.

I wonder... I just wonder, that's all.

_She took a bite out of the mouse, but it had no taste on her tongue, which was sickening, and she expelled it instantly._

_Macavity did this. Who would he come after next? Would he come after her again? Did he do this just to hurt her? Why couldn't he leave her alone?_

_No, that wasn't right. She took a breath and a brave expression crossed her face, as if she thought or knew that she had to calm._

_Well, a brave expression tried to cross her face. It was chased away by the one of fright and grief, as she pulled the tatter of a blanket closely around her._

_Earlier, she had eaten, but it wouldn't be happening again, she thought with a sigh. One delicate paw caressed the steel floor of the oven, avoiding a piece of chewed mouse. Her stance was still scared, but her eyes softened into misery as she looked at the floor. As long as she stayed in the oven, she was safe. She could cry, she could starve herself, but here, in his favorite place, no harm would come to Demeter. Imagining she could still feel his paws around her, she lay down, wanting to sleep and dream it all away..._

_An instant later, she was jolted by a scream._

Sounds break me out of my reverie, and my head snaps back towards my nest. I stand and drift between the statues back towards it, unnerved by the how steady it is. It sounds like a noise that a statue would make, just a broken, muffled repetition, not unlike someone being beaten to death with a pillow, but they are silent, and the sound is from elsewhere.

When I do step off of the black carpet of the prayer room, let the fog slide away into crisp focus, then I come to earth. I listen for an instant, and follow the odd noise from here, across the dining room in all its grace, through the overly bright and modern kitchen, into the little room set aside for me. There, amid the pillows, not moved from the position I left him in, he lies racked by the sounds, jerking up and down in time to them.

It takes me a minute to realize that in his sleep, Alonzo is sobbing.

_The shred of a moon was not high or low, not cold or warm, but just there for the ultimate purpose it is always there- illumination._

_On the silhouette of a maned cat, so furious that every one of his hairs stood on end, it didn't shine at all, leaving him completely in the dark, while just a few feet away, it lit two figures lounging dully on the sidewalk._

_Between them flowed a low murmur of conversation, as perhaps was happening for every cat around the junkyard that night. They were oddly subdued, absorbed in their conversation, oblivious to their surroundings, even the danger just a few feet away._

_The rumors were only about one thing. They were about, of course, a dead cat. Why he was dead._

_Was it Macavity? They had heard no more than usual- they would have thought that he would have said something to them._

_On the coarse concrete of the sidewalk, on of the cats rolled over to take in the shiver of moon as she whispered, "What do you think's gonna 'appen now?"_

_The other leaned his elbows against cool asphalt, his spine curving gracefully as his body slid to the street. On the darkness of the asphalt, he was a saffron scar, and not even the darkness could make it duller. "Life goes on. We're gonna stay outa the junkyard for awhile, I guess. They'll get over it. They always do."_

_Above them, the moon kept smiling, unaware of the danger stalking closer to the orange felines with every moment that flowed by._

I'm in the prayer room again; my eyes squeezed close so hard it hurts my head, my body arched in a bow. In front of me, I can feel cold air wash off the proud statue of Bastet, flowing around her marble body as she stares blankly into an eternity of mist.

She does not deign to look at me, like a good cat goddess.

My heart is thrumming in my neck, my chest, the pit of my stomach as I pray, trying to grasp some sort of inner peace. My mind does not calm, though, merely shoots from one thought to the next, as I try to piece together what is going to happen now, in a world without our everlasting leader.

My frantic prayers echo into the silence of infinity, and lie there unanswered.

_His eyes narrowed with fury and excitement._

_So many ways to do this, and only one thing he could choose, out of all of his options._

_In front of him, his targets' furs seared their color brazenly into the otherwise respectful night. Their watcher seemed to take it as a personal insult._

_His tail lashed like a whip from side to side, charged with the ever building adrenaline that permeated his body._

_One of them rolled slowly over, and her mouth released words that he couldn't hear from where he lurked._

_His lips curled back in a snarl, fangs gleaming chillingly in the icy light, and like liquid, he flowed through the shadows towards them._

When I open my eyes, the room's walls are no longer soft and surrounding but suffocating and dreadful. They close in on me, their grey softness threatening and ready to pound my life out...

I run.

_There is a scream, and many cats hear it, but Demeter burrows down further into the ragtag bedding scattered around the oven, telling herself that she heard nothing._

When I reach the dining room door, I am stopped.

It hurts. Down and backwards, I tumble until a jarring thud that reverberates through my body tells me I have hit the floor. A scant instant later, a painful noise tells me that the cat I ran into has done the same.

"Ow..."

I agree with a groan of my own, then think about pulling myself up. As if in protest, every bone in my body starts its own private fantasy of pain.

I hadn't realized Alonzo was awake yet. How long had I spent praying to empty space?

It doesn't matter. He seems to concur and doesn't stir.

At first, it's peaceful. I stare at the plastered ceiling and try to put some sense into the events of the last few days, something which I've been doing since it all started.

Nothing.

"Cass?" It's an interesting way to converse, lying face up on the ground.

"Yes?"

"What's going on?"

"You were standing in the doorway and I ran into the room- I didn't see you- and then-"

"No, I mean what's going on in the junkyard. How did all of this shit start? Why did it start?"

"Watch your language," is the first thing out of my mouth. He knows I hate it when he curses.

"Shitshitshi-"

"Alonzo!"

There is a stir, and he sits up, paws massaging the bridge of his nose. "I'm sorry. But I feel like sh- like crap. My entire body hurts, I'm covered in _filth_, I can feel it caked all over me. Under my fingernails, in my tail, on my face, even inside my mouth. I'm going insane. Need a paw up?"

Without speaking, I slowly extend my left paw, and he clutches it with one grimy hand and pulls me towards him. Then we're both sitting up and staring at each other, hands still locked, and for a second, a flash of understanding fuses our gazes. We stare for a little while longer, until one of his eyes snaps shut in a blink, and it's gone.

I stand, and pull him up with me. I want to say something understanding, loving, something that will make everything better, but instead, my nose wrinkles at the fresh smell of mud. "Go clean yourself off."

_He sleeps._

_Old Deuteronomy has been told, but he didn't shed tears. Instead, he went out to the kittens, letting them hug him and cry on him, and looked up into the sky._

_He took Victoria's head in his hands, turned it towards the moon, and told her to smile for Munkustrap._

_Now he sleeps, peaceful as can be. He never shed any tears, not from coldness, but because he has faith that so many don't. He believes in his son, sitting up in the Heaviside, smiling down on them. Many things have happened, and he believes in taking them as they come, savoring the things that last._

_So he sleeps, ready to go back out and comfort the Jellicles in the morning, his own sadness behind him._

_He sleeps. He is wise but not omnipotent. This cat is ancient, and his dreams run deep._

_The screaming, right outside his den, does not wake him. In his sleep he smiles, believing that all is well._

"Better?" An amused look sits on his face, just a tiny smile, but a smile nonetheless. The smell of mud is gone, and he stands in the door of my little gray room like a specter, black and white, with no brown anywhere. It's been scoured off at last.

Took long enough, too. The sticks of incense have burned halfway down.

"Sure." I smile, but he doesn't return it. Instead, the happiness on his face falls off like a bad mask, and shatters on the carpet.

Bastet stares impassively above our heads.

"Why did it happen, Cass?"

"I don't know..." For an instant, I forget that I'm talking to a determined atheist, "Everlasting Cat, and Bastet, only they know."

His expression hardens, as he remembers what this room is to me. "And what have they told you? Have you prayed until your mouth went numb, and did they come from on high and tell you who did it, and why they did it, and how to make every da- everything better?"

My hands rise up defensively, I feel my eyes widen. "Alonzo, don't. Please. They're there, I know they'll take care of everything. You just have to have faith."

"I _don't_ have faith! How can I? This wasn't supposed to happen! And if you say anything, anything at all along the lines of, 'It's all part of a plan', or 'It's up to them', I swear... I'll..."

I take a step back instantly and crash into the icy surface of the statue. Painful radiance bursts out in front of my eyes, then blossoms away. As it fades, Alonzo's face becomes clear, like a ship sailing out of a storm. His mouth is open, his eyes wide.

"Sorry, Cass, I didn't mean it, I really didn't. It's just-" he stops.

Now the edges of my eyes tingle, and my head is full of air. "Ever wondered why the priestess could date an atheist?"

"No."

Serenely, my face melts into a smile. "Neither did I."

"Cassandra..."

I pause, watching his expression try to decide what it is.

"I'm scared."

That, at least, I can understand. "So am I, Alonzo."

_Admetus and Bombalurina are the first to run over, and at first they don't know what it is they see._

_It's furious. It's violent. Blood already sprays over pavement._

_It's dreadful, as Bomby will say later._

_Barely recognizable, the Tugger has one bright orange cat on the ground, and is shredding chunks of flesh out of it, in snarling fury. Frantically, another cat claws on his back, but the only notice he takes of this is, periodically, to roll his entire body over and shake her off, slamming his captive jarringly back down on the ground when he lands again._

_Completely against her nature though it is, Bombalurina screams, and Admetus lets out a terrified yelp._

_In a panic, Rumpelteazer dashes towards them, burying her face in the vicinity of Bombalurina's collarbone. Something muffled emerges, and the queen shoots a desperate glance at Admetus, who shakes his head, still panicked. Against her front, hot tears soak into her fur, and she feels a bit of a heel when she pushes the sobbing queen away to throw herself into the fray..._


	4. the junkyard I

**Note-** An apology to fans of a character who is killed. There will be more death ahead, though I have no intention of turning this into some cheap slaughter fic. My policy to avoiding madeups means that it always has to be a canon character who dies.

I don't own CATS.

Learn German: Zufrieren freeze up

Schmelzen melt.

I likes German.

**----**

**4 (alonzo)**

I think about the darkness of the city, and compare it to this.

In here, everything is padded and warm- you might say stifling. I would. The only sound is a gentle whirr from the kitchen, with an occasional click as the dishwasher does whatever it's doing to make those noises. The air doesn't flow; instead it slogs downwards to settle on me like a suffocating blanket, which always smells of the same thing. Sweaty socks, carpet cleaner, Windex, and leftovers are the cocktail of the human home. Sometimes a whiff of incense from Cassandra's prayer room blows my way, and I clap my paws over my nose so as not to wake her with a sneeze.

What light there is doesn't come from a car or streetlight, but from the gentle green luminescence of a Sony glow in the dark digital display clock. It bathes everything in the house that slight verdant tint, as though every table, chair, and fish is ill.

Beside me, Cassandra sighs in her sleep and turns over.

Staring at the ceiling grows boring, and I stretch upwards, letting my back make little cracking noises as it arches.

I still don't feel clean. I feel as though all the dirt from yesterday was not washed off, merely sunk under my skin, and now it rests there permanently. My eyes blur as through a layer of it is filming them over, but as the familiar pain rises in my throat, I realize that it is just tears that I haven't let come out, still clamoring to be shed.

_Go away_, I tell them silently, but they won't or don't hear me.

_Admetus isn't sure what to do at first. His mouth flops open, and then snaps shut, as Bombalurina hits the Tugger squarely in the side, knocking him off his victim._

_Like some sort of demon, he turns on her, eyes alight with madness, and she screams again, the second time in one night._

_The tom makes up his mind in a flash, and he snaps away from staring at the fight to take Rumpelteazer by the shoulders. She is trying not to sob any more, but she doesn't know what else to do, and her breathing is ragged and rife with bursts of tears._

"_Listen to me." He resists the urge to shake her, just to make sure she hears, but barely. "I want you to go get Alonzo, and tell him there's a fight going on, one cat's already badly hurt, and another one will be soon."_

_Eyes gaping wide, she nods assent, but says nothing._

_Admetus lets go. "Who are you going to get, Rumpelteazer?" The question is punctuated by a shriek._

"'_lonzo," she whispers, looking at the ground._

"_What are you going to tell him?"_

"'_sa fight."_

"_Right. Run!"_

_For a minute, he watches the young queen dash away, then turns to the spectacle before him, and tries to think._

I crawl out of Cassandra's pillow heap, or house, or whatever they call it, and breathe deeply, but the air is just as thick out here, and I almost choke.

The tears have gone stale; the urge to shed them is less. Though it settles like a bad meal in the pit of my stomach, it no longer ravages my mind and throat. Instead, I feel confused, a bit scared, but peaceful, very peaceful. Maybe now, everything will start to go well once more.

The Sony clock flashes the number ten at me, and I feel as though I've slept too late. Ten already? How tired was I? And what of Cassandra, still asleep even now?

It'd be nice to think that the entire junkyard was at peace right now, asleep.

"'_elp!" Her voice comes to her as she runs, bursting forth energetically from her throat. "There's a fight goin' on! 'elp!"_

_That isn't right, she is supposed to be fetching someone. Munkus- no, he is dead. Alonzo! She's supposed to be fetching Alonzo!_

"_Alonzo!" There, that's better. Where is everyone, anyway?_

_Sleepily, a head pokes out from under the car. "'Teazer? What in the Fell are you doing?"_

"_There's a fight goin' on!" Her still wide eyes turn on those of Tumblebrutus. "Where's Alonzo? The Tugger's killin' Mungojerrie!"_

_The male kitten's eyes widen enough to match Rumpelteazer's. "I don't know where he is! I think he usually sleeps at this time, but..." Where does Alonzo sleep? The question hangs unanswered between them._

"_Hey, what's going on?" Another face lifts above the dashboard, but the kitten attached to this one has no need to widen his eyes- they are permanently like that. It is evident he has been crying, and unlike his brother, isn't trying to hide it._

"_No time!" Desperation seepes into her voice. "C'mon, guys! Jus' tell me, please!"_

"_Try Cassandra's house," suggests Tumblebrutus, at the same time as the other kitten asks,_

"_Tell you what?"_

_But she is gone already, leaving the two to puzzle the events of the last few minutes out._

Linoleum is colder than ice on my feet. Around me, the walls of plaster and wood are harder and more confining than steel.

All the doors in the house are closed- I'm restless and there's no way for me to get out. I can't become loud, or Cassandra's humans will know that I'm here.

I feel like a prisoner, a loved prisoner, but a prisoner nonetheless.

Biting my lip, I reassure myself it's just for a few more hours.

Another waft of sickening incense from her prayer room hits me, and I try not to throw up.

_How far is Cassandra's house? She knows where the graceful priestess lives, of course, because in the last week not one but two precious ancient incense burners (and a two thousand year old urn) have gone missing._

_Turn here, keep turning, go straight, go left, if it wasn't for adrenaline, she'd have collapsed two blocks ago._

_Isn't one of those big, fancy houses? Yes, probably. And a burglar alarm. She hates burglar alarms, but that can be taken care of._

_That's one thing; at least, she knows how to fix._

The clock says ten ten now, and I'm considering waking Cassandra up, to see if she'll let me out.

But I don't want to. When she was awake she looked stressed, scared, as if the slightest thing would make her run and hide. Asleep she looks peaceful and strong again.

Of course she's strong. I don't know why. Could be it's her faith, or perhaps she's just something far better than I deserve.

With little else to do, I sit down among the pillows, looking at her face for what feels like the first time since we met.

It says 'priestess' all over it. Maybe that's why she went ahead and found religion. Maybe that's her fascination with ancient Egypt, and Greece, and whatever other countries her gods and goddesses are from. Cats look at her, and think of her automatically as a prophet.

I remember her eyes, even when she sleeps. They are large and full of mist, as blue as felinely possible. Her face is smooth, with high, proud cheekbones, and a nose that is as prideful. I'm not sure of what to call it, because there's nothing really flattering except 'strong', or maybe 'Roman'.

Her lips aren't full, but neither are they thin, and her forehead is high. Considered in separate pieces I suppose she is not so beautiful, but somehow, putting all of that together makes a face to weaken any tom.

Right now, it's comforting just to look at, and feel safe, because she's strong, even when I'm weak.

Slowly, my thoughts sink into the air around me, which grows heavier and softer, until it presses against me, closing my eyes, my ears, my mind, into the bliss of sleep.

_It's this one, she knows. A royal red three story, loose windows on the bottom floor, shaky tiles, so the roof is dangerous, and an automatic burglar alarm that turned on at ten oh clock._

_Looking at the moon, she wonders idly if a cat would set off the alarm._

_Probably. Knowing these rich people._

_Well, she might as well get started. How long will it take to switch off the alarm?_

_Ten-fifteen minutes, if it was well hidden._

_Damn! Isn't there some way to make this go faster?_

_Bombalurina's life is flashing in front of her eyes. Actually, the Tugger is flashing in front of her eyes, alternating with Admetus, who had decided he was sick of waiting and jumped in to help, and the pavement. But her life is flashing in front of her mind._

_Is it possible she's going to die? That doesn't even bear thinking about._

_No._

_No._

_No._

_But the Tugger has some demonic strength, and she doesn't know where it's coming from, only that it's two on one now, and the one is winning. Even though several of the wounds he has taken should be crippling. He isn't even that muscular- the two of them should have been able to handle him easily._

_But she is ripped open in a dozen places, and Admetus in nearly as many, and instead of Tugger, they are the ones tiring._

_There. The orange queen leans back to admire her handiwork. The alarm looks untouched, she is particularly proud of that. The clock on it keeps ticking, the little red light blinks, and the display even says that it's still running._

_Mungojerrie will be proud of her._

_Tracing her paw happily over the plastic, she reads ten nineteen on the clock, and glances over her shoulder, instinctively, to tell... No one._

_Right. She's working this mission alone. She knows that._

_Vigorously, she shakes her head in an effort to clear it, and moves on into the lot._

_Grass tickles her feet, but she is too serious to giggle tonight. Any other time, any other mood, she would be driving her brother crazy and almost giving their presence away, but this is too important._

_If she finds him- doubt sidles into her mind, a black shadow on her hope- what can Alonzo do? That Bombalurina and Admetus both can't? Nothing. She can't think of anything, but she keeps going, sliding her paws around a window frame. This is no time for niceties such as a door, she thinks grimly._

_With a jerk of her arm, she breaks the screen loose, and leans it against the bricks beside the window, then goes to work on the lock inside of the thing._

_It's a lot easier if she just thinks of this as another assignment._

_Then sweat doesn't bead on her palm as she tries to retain a grip on the little springs, and the image of the Tugger ripping out chunks of her brother's flesh doesn't keep drifting in front of her eyes, when what she should be seeing is the little catch on the outside of the glass._

_It's hard._

_Even harder, when the thing springs open and out, and she catapults herself inside, landing cautiously on all fours._

_Her first instinct is to wait for him to follow her in, but he doesn't. Mentally, she pinches herself, then moves on down the hall, calling Cassandra's name softly._

"_Cassandra? Cass? Where are you?"_

_No answer, save the constant tick of her family's clock, echoing forlornly down the corridors that Rumpelteazer stalks._

"_Cassandra? Your priestessness?"_

_This was getting her nowhere- nowhere!_

"_Cassandra!" Finally, she just screams at the top of her lungs, no longer caring if she woke the human._

"Alonzo!"

"C'mon, Munky, the junkyard can secure itself tomorrow, just lemme sleep."

"Alonzo, be serious! Wake up!" Something's wrong here. The bed is too soft, the air is too warm, and the voice is definitely not Munkustrap, coming to wake me up. It's prouder, colder and far more female. In fact...

"Cassandra?"

"Thank Bastet you're finally awake!" Her paws clasp around mine, and in a minute their pulling me up through the air with surprising strength. She whirls me around to face the door, and shoves me towards it. "Rumpelteazer?" The orange queen materializes, her face looking as though she can see a train hurtling towards her. Ice closes in around my stomach. For a short time, it had seemed like everything would be alright.

"'lonzo, it's the Tugger, 'e's killin' my brother- I think 'e's gone mad!" This out, she bursts into tears, and Cassandra puts her arms around her, murmuring something, and it becomes evident just how young the thief cat really is, because 'sixteen' permeates her manner, her fear, her entire shaking body.

"Well?" Cassandra's eyes bore into mine, "Get out there." The look on my face must reflect the panic in my mind, because she softens, a little bit. "You don't have to handle it like Munkustrap would. Handle it the way you think it needs to be handled. Just go!"

My feet take off before my brain can move, and the last thing that I remember thinking is the word 'reassuring', in a highly sarcastic type voice, before there is only me running, and the night.

"_Are you okay?"_

_Still indignant at having essentially been kicked out of the fight, Bombalurina leans over the body_

_(oh, god, did she just think the word 'body'?)_

_the form of Mungojerrie._

"_Mungojerrie?" There is no response, though his eyes are open, staring at the sky. She doesn't even want to look at bloody holes torn all over his body, or the sears of blood that rip through his fur, but she does anyway. Blood is flowing over the pavement, gleaming blackly at the sky. It's flowing over her hands, making her grip more slippery than ever, warmly creeping around her legs as she kneels beside him, unable to imagine how someone can lose this much blood and still be breathing._

_Is he still breathing? She checks carefully, watching his chest rise and fall with increasing difficulty._

_Rise._

_Fall._

_Rise._

_Fall._

_Rise._

_Fall._

_Nothing._

_What? That's wrong! That's wrong!_

_Blood soaked, her hand slides easily off of his face as she tried to slap him, and gently, his head falls to the side._

_Like the head of a doll, it stays there._

"Quaxo!" I've been pounding on the hardwood until my paw literally began to bleed, and I'm still doing it, smearing the winy liquid all over his door. "Quaxo!" My voice is starting to go hoarse, and every time I slam my fist down, a fresh shock of pain jolts up from my wrist to my elbow. "Quax-" The yell breaks into a cough, racking my throat and chest. My mouth is full of sandpaper, lead weights where my lungs should be.

Ready to give up, I lower my hands and slump against the clean, white paneling of his house, and wonder if the job gets easier with time.

I doubt it.

"Hello?"

A burst of energy sees me to my feet. "Quaxo!"

"Alonzo? What do you-"

"No time! Do that thing you do!"

"What thing?"

"That thing! You know, where your fur goes all shiny, and-"

"Why do you want me to-"

"No _time_! Just do it!"

There must be something in my tone, because though he gapes at me like I've lost my mind, he disappears inside, only to climb out the window a moment later, sparkles dancing through his pelt merrily.

"Alonzo this had better be-"

I feel the twitch below my eye, "There's no time for that. How fast can you get us to the junkyard?"

He gives me the same weirded out look as a minute ago, and carelessly tosses one paw over his shoulder. There's a brief inwards rushing sensation, as though all of my organs are trying to compact into a single mass, then an unpoetic twanging. In one ineffable disorienting motion, the scenery ripples into itself and folds around in a circle, and at the last minute I can't help closing my eyes to prevent throwing up yet again-

and we're here, when I open them once more.

I never want to do that again.

"'Lonzo? Hey, Alonzo? Care to tell me-"

I rub the bridge of my nose, telling myself that I do indeed remember the location I was given. "No time," I repeat, my voice all but gone, "that way." I let my paw poke the air in the direction that feels right, and Quaxo starts to wander that way bemusedly.

"Run!" The word forces itself from me, and I don't have time to feel like a monster before I've taken off myself in that direction practically dragging the magical cat behind me.

_Admetus tears at the Tugger, then stumbles back as he is forced off of the raging creature for the jillionth time. For the_

_(a similar number)_

_nth time, he launches himself off the asphalt and back towards his newfound enemy, wondering thoughts_

_(the energy, Bast, does it never run out, how does he keep fighting?)_

_to incoherent to understand._

_Every muscle in his body aches with fatigue. Maybe it was rude to force Bomby out of this. Maybe it was kind of stupid. Right now, all he knows is that he's not going to last much longer, and one look at the Tugger's face tells him that if he loses, he is most definitely going to die._

"_Zufrieren_!"

I'm going to pretend to understand the word Quaxo or Mistoffelees or whatever he's calling himself now throws out. I'm going to pretend it made sense, because the air crackles blue, and the stars disappear for a minute, and then the scene is still.

Too still. Mungojerrie and Bombalurina are stone cold statues, one staring transfixed at the fighters, the other looking blankly, catatonically upwards at where the stars are fading back into view on the black velvet of the night.

On the equally black street, like a pair of demented dancers, the Tugger and Admetus are crashing into each other, a picture of motion captured. Not a hair moves, not a muscle twitches, the wind around them seems to have ceased. A chill shivers down my spine, and I turn away on pretext of looking at Mistoffelees. "Can you un... freeze everyone but the Tugger?"

Confidently, he crooks his finger and murmurs "_Schmelzen_."

Instantly, the scene is alive again. Wind whispers through Bomby's fur, and she glances wildly around, confused, as Admetus rebounds off the Tugger and crashes to the pavement in a mostly white heap, panting.

It seems to take him a minute to realize that the Tugger isn't going to leap on him, because he stiffens for a scant instant, then melts.

Again, I make eye contact with Mistoffelees, and chills creep up my back again. I have to resist the suddenly strong urge to hide from him, and manage to tell him to do what he can for Mungojerrie, hoping to pass off the fear in my voice as stress.

I'm not sure if it works, but I stride out to the street, and kneel beside Admetus. "You okay, man?" Somehow, I can't bring myself to sound more concerned.

"Nah... I'm... just... playing... dead..." At least he can still be sarcastic. Perfunctionally, I press my paw against his neck, but the steady rhythm tells me that his pulse is not going anywhere, and I cuff him decisively across the ears.

"Ow!" Halfheartedly, he tries to raise a paw in defense, but it flops bloodlessly to the ground. "What was that for, man?"

"For being bloody stupid." My voice is severe, but inside, I'm just glad my friend is alright, particularly when I turn to the frozen image of the Tugger, and see the expression on his face. It doesn't just chill me, it damn well terrifies me. There is no sanity left in his gaze, Bast, Rumpelteazer was right. He's crazed.

"Um, Alonzo?" I turn around at the voice of Mistoffelees, sounding like the almost-kitten Quaxo once more. "We've lost Mungojerrie."


	5. the junkyard II

**Note-** Toms can be very stupid. I don't own CATS. Long periods of writer's block plagued this part.

**----**

**5**

"Does it hurt if I do this?"

"Ow! Idiot, you just punched me in the arm!"

"Really? Does it hurt if I do this?"

"Ow! Plato?"

"Yeah?"

"You see the spots where it's gone all dark under the fur, kind of like a _bruise_?"

"Yeah?"

"Don't hit them!"

Plato sniggers. A few feet away, Bombalurina rolls her eyes back so far in her head it hurts just to look at it. Jennyanydots rushes in, throwing her paws up and telling Plato if he's not going to stop bothering her patient, would he please just leave her infirmary? This, for no reason apparent, causes both Plato and Admetus to crack up, and I, leaning on the wall, have to clamp a paw over my mouth to stifle a snort of laughter.

Bomby just sighs disgustedly and rolls over on the metal floor, muttering something about toms.

In the corner, the Tugger casts a sobering chill over everything, causing every cat in the oven to almost instinctively avoid glancing towards the back, where I had him put.

Later, the twins are going to come and look at him. It's possible their mind-magic, or whatever it is they call it, can do something for his apparent psychosis.

A thin straw. We're grasping at a very thin straw here, and we all know it.

The only one to really mourn for Mungojerrie was Rumpelteazer- the poor girl is still with Cassandra, confusing my girlfriend beyond belief, because she knows no more in the way of what to do for a hysterical teenager than I do.

Oh, not that we didn't feel it. It was sad, and I don't think anyone will be able to look at Rumpelteazer mooning along without her brother with a dry eye for a while, but almost no one really knew them, and even fewer trusted them.

Take Bomby. As far as I can tell, she used to date Mungojerrie (but is there any tom she didn't used to date?) and her only reaction to his death was shock, followed by anger. And it wasn't even new; it was her leftover fury from the death of Munkustrap. It seems to be her way of dealing with things.

"Does it hurt if I do this?" As Plato twists the bruise on Admetus's arm in a pinch, the other tom waves his paws up and bats his friend away.

"_Stop_ it, dorkus!"

"I swear, if all you two are going to do is this all day, just get your visitor out of my infirmary, mister Admetus!"

Both of them open their mouths to respond, and I tune them out, drifting over to where Bomby lays on a blanket haphazardly spread over the steel, doing something like sulking. She doesn't notice me at first, because she's busy being disgusted with my friends, but after a minute, she turns to glare at me. There's force enough in that look to cause me to doubt my sanity briefly, and I'm fairly sure trying to hold that gaze is doom.

To look down, or not to look down? In the end, my instinct for survival takes over, and I drag my eyes to the scraped oven metal.

"Well, what do you have to say for yourself?"

I snap them up again, startled. "What do you mean, what do I have to say for myself?"

Her own eyes narrow. "I'm not going to say this is your fault, but you know, it could have been avoided if you'd actually been in the junkyard. You were supposed to be there anyway."

I've nothing to say to that, mainly because it's true, so I just stare, and try my hardest not to look down again.

"You know Munkustrap would have broken up the fight himself."

Saying the words, "I'm not Munkustrap," in the most level tone of voice I can manage, I turn to go, mainly because I don't know what else to say. Her voice follows me out, and still echoes in my mind as I lean on the oven just beside the door, then slump down to the dirt, letting my head loll back. For no reason, the urge to cry washes over me again, and I lean my head forward into my hands, fighting the ache out of my throat with every ounce of my willpower. Across from me, the broken car makes a yellow and red stain on the lightening haze of morning in the city.

Behind me, the oven's aluminum cave warps and twists the sound of Admetus and Plato being told off into something like an alien invasion.

A car whirrs.

A bird trills for the morning.

A shrill bark breaks the stillness to the west, but it settles back in like a cloak.

The stillness falls uneasily over us all, muffling the kittens, some of who are still sobbing, thrumming with anti-life, making the air heavy and slow and sad.

It creeps into the oven and settles over Demeter, Admetus, Bombalurina, Plato and even Jennyanydots, caressing the statue that is Tugger, seeming to say 'See? Look what has become of you...'

_As the dawn inches into view above heaps of trash, this kitten finds it a fresh reason to cry._

"_Mungojerrie" her voice trembles out a tune that suddenly sounds forlorn, "and Rumpelteazer... We're notorious..." it cracks, and then crashes to the ground. Though she squeezes her eyes shut determinedly, telling herself to be brave, a teardrop glistens sinisterly as it oozes its way out. Then one crawls from her other eye, slicking down her fur as it runs down her cheek, and another, and another, until there are just the tears, and nothing more._

How long has it been since I last ate or slept? Bast only knows. As the twins examine the statue that was Tugger, I pretend to stand still and at attention, but inwardly my stomach walls are slowly collapsing upon themselves, leaving a horrible empty feeling behind.

"-would be impossible without a total memory wipe."

Watching them move and speak kind of creeps me out, though not as much as a glimpse of the crazed, frozen statue that I constantly dodge my eyes around.

"Even if we could do that-"

"He'd have to learn everything again. Everything."

"From singing to walking to talking."

They are never in each other's way, avoiding the other like dancers. Each picks up the other's sentences perfectly, by way of something much stranger than mere intuition. She moves forward, he moves back. He moves right, she moves left. It's demented. And scary. All of a sudden I see why so many cats tend to avoid them, because they send chills inching up my spine.

"Alonzo? Are you listening?" Tantomile seems the most vocal.

"Of course." I'm listening. I wish I wasn't but I am.

A sigh escapes from Coricopat. "We wish it was not like this-" his voice is whisper soft, as if from disuse.

"-but it is." Hers is businesslike, reminding me of a school's principal, or maybe an especially strict teacher. "The kindest thing you can do for him is a quick, clean death." With that, she turns on her heel and walks, no, stalks away as if it bothers her to be in my presence. An apologetic shrug on his shoulders, he follows, and I find myself struggling to quell hate rising like bile in my throat.

Are they going to go tell the junkyard that Munkustrap's brother is gone too? Or merely leaving the job to me, and getting their clean, magical paws away from us common cats.

My lip curls up in a snarl, and I lean back against the outside of the oven for an instant, then flip, letting the feel of cool metal against my forehead batter my rising temper. I will keep calm. Probably.

_She sits down dejectedly on the tire, tears still flowing like a river from her eyes. But like a bad silent movie, she makes no noise, merely flashes her saffron fur against the night... alone._

_She wants to stop crying nearly as much as she wants to keep it up forever, and drown the junkyard, no, the entire world with her tears. Nothing is right anymore._

_It's too cold. Icy winds she hadn't noticed last night blow right through her, freezing the kitten to the bone. It is evident that she is a kitten now, barely still one, but one nonetheless._

_The night is blacker, sucking all emotion but emptiness up into its unforgiving void. The stars are duller, as though they are victims of the vacuum of dark, and the junkyard is forlorn, with few cats in sight._

_Desolate. Empty._

_All alone._

_The inside of the oven is much warmer, shielded against autumn winds, and the little light that Quaxo made bobs happily up and down, giving everything a cozy glow._

_The old Gumbie cat bustles around her patients, serving tea and bringing blankets, and on occasion, trying to engage the curled up form of Demeter in conversation to little or no avail._

_She tries not to show that she's worried, with a determined smile lighting her face, but it doesn't reach her eyes, and her hand shakes as she changes the bandages on the pair she calls 'such brave cats'._

_Bombalurina stares at the ceiling, and, occasionally, at her sister, a cloud of worry drifting in front of her own eyes. The only sound that the black and gold queen has made all night was a quiet moan when they brought the Tugger in._

_Now she is a lump of fur in the corner, lying and facing the wall. She hasn't eaten since yesterday, she spit out the mouse that they gave her today, and the most motion they have coaxed out of her, was to pull the blanket that Jenny dropped on the floor beside her over her head, like a three year old hiding from a bogeyman._

_Bombalurina's lips part in a barely audible sentence. "Keep living, sister."_

_And then her eyes begin to close drowsily, and her mind spins in circles until her consciousness melts away into the darkness of a dreamless sleep._

It's three in the morning, and I'm slumped against the oven, my eyes glazed over as I stare at the sky.

The sounds of the city are still unchanged, but I can no longer immerse myself in them. They and I are a separate world now, and their once comforting noise is distant and muted, as if heard through bulletproof glass. In fact, the entire world has gone blurry again, and I draw deeper and deeper into myself, away from the constant beat of traffic and humans and life going on but leaving me behind.

The noise I just let out is not a sob. It's a breath. A very ragged, sudden breath.

Trying to blink the blur from my eyes, I wonder where Cassandra is now.

(_Should she go down to the junkyard? She doesn't want to. She wants to stay in her human's house, where it's safe._

_To stay in the prayer room, kneeling before the great icy statue of Bastet._

_And she would. But as she looks up at the cat goddess, and her elegant marble face is unchanged, uncaring, she feels terribly, terribly small and alone. In an instant, the universe she knew is flipped to a great, cold one that doesn't know or care if she lives or dies, and her heart turns to ice and drops into her gut._

_Now, as she staggers out of her house, she heads for the 'yard, to find there the security her gods would deny her._)

Probably praying to her gods, safe and warm. I hope she finds the answers that she searches for with them. I can't imagine what she'd do without them. Or what I'd do without her.

_In the darkness, he smiles._

_The news has just reached him, and he couldn't be more pleased. It has worked. It has worked very well._

_He stands up, and slivers of light slanting through slats of wood play over ginger fur, then nothing as he moves away from the room's only light source._

_Wood creaks beneath his paws, marking his progress around the room._

_All is well and good, then._

_It would have been better, if he had thought of this initially, but simple revenge had been on his mind back then. But this is so much better._

_He thinks of his agents, stalking the streets like shadows of the apocalypse. He thinks of the fate of Rum Tum Tugger, a touch he wishes he had thought of himself, but one that delights him nonetheless. The junkyard is weakening by the minute. Munkustrap, soft fool, could not have chosen a worse heir._

_Still, it couldn't hurt to help things along. Especially if the idiot began to show signs of competence._

_He extends his paw, and a spark flickers into life. A rough voice rolls out of his mouth, and the spark sucks it up like a vacuum. "Ombre. I have a task for you..."_

_The cat on the other end listens silently as this mad, sane cat unrolls the job he has thought up, then with a brief word of acknowledgement, sets out. The ginger cat's fist snaps shut around the spark, and in the darkness, he smiles one more time._

"Jenny?" Three fifteen. I want to be under the car, safe and learning once more to be one with the darkness. Instead, I'm running away from it like a child.

"Yes?" Her voice is cheerful enough to make me wince.

"Can all of the Jellicles be around here by," quick mental calculation, "four thirty? I need to talk to them."

"Certainly." She sounds so old, so quickly. "I'll go round them up myself, shall I?"

For a minute I stare, then the sarcasm in her tone cuts through my barrier of exhaustion and hunger, and I stammer out an apology. "I didn't mean that. I mean, I didn't, I can go, I just-"

"Shhhh." Gently, she hovers her paw over her mouth. "You'll wake the patients. Alonzo, you're asking the wrong cat, that's all. Go find-"

"Quaxo," I sigh, "right?"

Jenny raises both eyebrows. "Well, yes. It shouldn't be too hard, I think that he's still hanging around the junkyard. You know, in case-"

"In case someone needs him." Massaging my temples with my paws, I mutter some sort of thanks and stumble out of the oven, thinking about sleep.

_Still angry for reasons that do not come to her easily, Tantomile stalks across the night. Her brother tries, but it hard-pressed to keep up the pace at which she walks, his own mind still rebounding with confusion._

_When they reach the car trunk, she settles herself delicately in place, and closes her eyes, breathing in and out slowly. For once, Coricopat does not follow her example, but lets his eyes wander up to the heavens, taking in thousands upon thousands of shining stars._

_At least they are always there. As long as there is a sky above for him to watch, and the earth below for his sister to tune into, everything will be alright._

_As often happens, his breathing begins to slow, to match his sister's and the stars fuzz gently in and out, as she pulls him into her soft meditation._

_He lets his eyes drop shut, to see what she sees, feel what she feels. Rust beneath her, air flowing around them both, whirling and dancing invisibly. Follow the nearest current on a whim, as it playfully dances in and out of countless wrecks, crushed bicycles, rusted appliances, wires and pieces of metal bent and twisted into shapes so alien that they become impossible to identify. But you can feel what they once were, because they remember. They remember very well._

_Out the fence, down the street, into the alleys, into warehouses, where cats walk, fight, where shadows gather and people die..._

_As one, their eyes snap open, their heads whip around so that they stare each other in the face. Both of them know what the other knows, and both of them feel what the other feels..._

_(Fear.)_

_It's not a pleasant emotion._

_Tantomile is the first to speak. "I'm going."_

_Almost instantly, he objects._

_She counters._

_Though they exchange words outwardly, most of their argument takes place on the inside, a clash of knowledge and feelings._

"_If you go, I'm going with you."_

"_No, you're not."_

_She's already won the argument. Almost always, she wins. He struggles with this, but it's out of his hands, and he can't do anything about it. So he stops trying. Instead, he takes his sister's hands in his, genuine fear reflected in his eyes. "Be careful."_

_Both of them know what is left unsaid between the siblings who have been close enough since birth to be almost one. There is no need even to think it, and then she's gone._

_(Are you tense when you sense-)_

_He watches her go._

_(-there's a storm in the air?)_

_A kitten crawls out from under the car, and he doesn't even notice. In her way, she watches him curiously for a minute, as every hair on his body silently stands on end. It scares her, but she doesn't run, or even back away. Because she saw nothing and heard quite a bit, but this kitten thinks a lot about what she hears, and comes to her own conclusions._

"_Coricopat?"_

_He doesn't move a muscle, not even to twitch. "What?"_

"_Is there a storm gathering?" Her eyes are kittenishly innocent, but a sparkle in them seems older than she could possibly be, and if he was looking at her, he would wonder what she was thinking._

_Instead, he continues to stare and responds in a word, "Yes," though even a kitten can see that there is not a cloud in the sky._


	6. alonzo III

**Note- ** I think the fic's about half done now. I had no idea it would shape up to be this long- hell, it didn't even start as a CATS fanfic! It started as just a freewriting exercise. I'm not too happy with this chapter.

A bit more German: Aufwachen means wake up.

Guess what I don't own? A: CATS!

**----**

**6**

"Quaxo! Quaxo!"

"Mwha?"

"Wake up? C'mon, man. I need you."

"Again?" He tries to sound angered, but fails miserably. Instead his voice shakes with apprehension. "What is it this time?"

"You gotta-" I stop, my voice dying in my throat, and my body slumps with fatigue. "summon-" Whatever it is that's been keeping me going for so long suddenly flies away and hits me with it's bill, knocking words and breath from me in one deadly sweep. "Gotta-" The last thing that I remember is the world falling in on me, then blackness, beautiful, blissful blackness.

_A giggle echoes shrilly out over the junkyard, and a pigeon flies from its perch, cooing in terror._

_She spins in a lazy circle then crumples to her knees- the moon is almost set, but its light does not grow softer or kinder on the orange stain her fur makes on the night. It is icy as ever, sending shivers through her._

_Is she laughing or crying?_

_Maybe both._

_Where will she go now?_

_Where will she go?_

_Shaking like a leaf, she quivers on her feet, not standing so much as quaking in place._

_And then she runs._

_And runs._

_The night absorbs the sound of her footsteps, and the moonlight forgets the sight of her pelt._

_The city is unchanged._

_Cassandra is lost on streets she doesn't know- panic sears through her brain irrationally. Everywhere she turns, she sees nothing but the same neon lights, flickering angrily, taxis screeching around corners, fog creeping into the early morning streets, an overpowering blanket._

_She backs up, away from it, towards the dark and quiet of a comforting looking alleyway, and the city consumes her._

Warmth. I had no idea warmth could be so lovely.

No. Something's wrong. There is no one, and I don't know where I am, except that I want to stay here and never move again. Something cushions me beneath and perhaps it is a blanket draped over me above, but it's wrong! I have to be somewhere, doing something, even if I can't remember what it is, and I have to go now. I have to!

But even as I try to stand, I am pressed back down, and a voice tells me to lay still. I will later remember protesting, but it isn't to be argued with, because my body agrees with it, and I slip away back into my dreams.

_The oven has one more patient, one more nurse, and now the tuxedo tom named Quaxo paces outside, guarding it simply because there is no one else to do so. A thousand thoughts whirr busily inside his mind, shaping a hundred possible places to go from here, none of them good._

_Inside, Jellylorum sighs with disgust. All four of them are idiots, but him most of all. Couldn't he just listen to her? Was it too much for her advice to- never mind. But she wasn't going to be soft on him. When he woke up, she would come down with both paws and screw what Jenny said about patients being left to rest._

_Sleep was well and good, and food as well, but rest was for the weak minded. She hadn't raised him to be weak._

_Ignoring the little voice which whispered she hadn't raised him at all, she glared down at four still forms that might well be dead, carefully guiding her eyes away from the feet of the horrid figure in the corner._

_What doesn't kill us, makes us strong._

This time it is light, running through the smoky glass and drilling through my eyelids- the light of morning and time to be active. My body still feels hollowed out and brittle as a dried leaf, but it is at last an energized leaf. I have things to do, yes, and it's high time I talked to the junkyard-

"Alonzo!"

That same voice hits me in razor tones, wiring through my brain and bypassing the free will circuits, yanking me up directly by my spine.

"What the hell do you think you're doing?" The voice reaches in me and presses the button that says 'cringe', and my ears fold down as my shoulders hunch in.

"Stand up this instant!"

Entirely bewildered, I can't stop myself from obeying, and I whirl around to look into a face set like cement.

"Now answer me!"

Finally I think to talk, somehow I can't force my mouth or throat to so much as twitch. Instead my eyes widened, and I bite my tongue until blood and pain begin to spread out of my mouth and trickle down my face, and my commander takes me by the shoulders and shakes me. "What the hell were you doing? Now go get something to eat and take care of your stupid junkyard, or I swear I'll have the hide from your back!"

You ever heard them say sometimes all you need is a shove in the right direction? Ha! Try a kick in the kidneys in the right direction, nothing motivates you like that.

You stumble head over heels towards where you need to go, and even if your balance is good you cascade all over the place, grasping constantly on what turns out to be thin air until you can support yourself on a handy wall, or maybe another cat. Jenny is generally a good bet.

"Alonzo..."

"Ngh." Is that all I can say? My mouth moves as though filled with glue and pencil shavings.

Jenny's eyes roll back in her head. "There's water in the corner and food beside it. Eat, then scram. I don't know when we'll need more sickbeds, and if you're well enough to walk, you're well enough to do your job."

Wonderful, I want to say. I want to be sarcastic and nasty, but maybe it's for the best that I can't get sound out. Instead, I merely stagger across the yellowed paint to hit the metal knees first before a bowl of water, and I teeter forwards, catching myself on my claws, almost as though I was kowtowing in worship of it. I feel like I should- water! It's the best idea in the world right now.

Jelly is glaring at me, so I don't dip my paws in it, or splash it over my face like I desperately want to, merely drag myself up to drinking level and lap thirstily at it, as it cleanses my throat, soothing over the dry, ravaged feeling with coolness that feels better than anything I've ever tasted. Taste. Yes, I should have food! And then I should go outside and think about what to do. I've been reacting this whole time, with no plan, no motivation except to get from one encounter to the next, and if I just sit down and mull this over, I'll figure out what to do. Munkustrap wouldn't have chosen me to be his successor if I didn't have it in me.

Right?

_Lost. Dammit! Where is Cassandra?_

_Is that all she's out here for? No._

_Many things drive Tantomile through the city streets, their flashes of neon spraying garish color over the world of the night. A corner of the feeling of urgency which pulses quickly, almost in beat with the bar signs and light ads, is concern for her friend, but mostly it is a feeling she cannot define._

_Fear. A monster, lurking beneath her fur, devouring her self-possession and making candy bar bites of her confidence. Nothing like this has ever pounded in her blood before, and it drives her faster, high on adrenaline, determined to do this for herself, through the night._

_She knows what she has seen, and what will come to pass._

_But perhaps it is, in the end, for the best._

"Alonzo!" Everlasting Cat, I never thought I would grow to hate my own name! "Alonzo!"

"What!" It is not my voice that flies out of my throat but a snarling wolf's and I feel it lash back on me, sagging. "I mean," I pound it softer, "what do you want, Quaxo? That I can actually do?" Maybe too soft. I need to master the art of what I can say and what is better bottled up inside of me.

His eyes dart away from mine, blinking a spark of reflected moonlight as they do. "I want to help you. You know. Like. With the junkyard."

"You what?"

"With stuff. Like, I can keep track of people... and... stuff... But I'll be useful. Really, I will. Munkustrap was gonna let me use my powers to protect the Junkyard, the Twins were training me for it-" he stops to gasp in a breath, "and you really my help. Even a Peke could see that." And then he lapses into a silence fraught with possibility- me biting my lip and staring at him, wondering what would happen if I said I could do this myself, just let the words on my tongue leap out and tear this into pieces. That can't happen. But I can feel it trying to anyway. By the look of apprehension on his face, he can too.

Okay, maybe I was a little too proud, but I always thought that I should do everything on my own. Right now, I'm just worn and beaten and hope that his mentors will forgive me when I tell him that I need all the help I can get. Maybe later, I'll learn to rely on just myself, but right now is the time to for once do something smart.

Even if he isn't ready.

After all, it's not like I was.

_It's five am, and the junkyard is still. Washing out the night to the east, barely distinguishable from the city's brightness, the sun thinks of rising, and through the air flows the damp, refreshed feeling that makes the junkyard cats believe that all is well._

_They sleep._

_Or most of them do._

_Alonzo thinks, trying to ignore Quaxo's still form, trying to quell the fear of the other cat's power as he sits motionless, tracking down every living Jellicle in London_

_(they hope, anyway)_

_with his mind. _

_In the infirmary, Bombalurina does not sleep, but lies awake, still watching Demeter for signs of life. In the new light, with brand new shadows dancing across the room, she realizes that she can make out her sister's ribs beneath unkempt and unwashed fur- and shudders, cold despite her blanket._

_On the streets, Cassandra dances with death, because He is stalking her in the form of a shadowy tom, and Tantomile has joined the three, creating an odd sort of morbid ballet to a soundtrack of early city traffic. For her, it's a race against time. She thinks not of what will happen when she makes her decision, only of one future, and her friend's life._

_A mind follows her, icy with dread and sorrow it is terribly resolved to as Coricopat sits on the car trunk, motionless as a statue, praying even in his subconscious that she will not get there in time, and feeling guilt-ridden for it._

_Somewhere, a monkey wrench dances around the gears. Her name is Rumpelteazer. We will watch her, and see what happens._

_But the sun does not watch. It doesn't see, it doesn't care, it just spins in the sky, bringing on the ever flowing onslaught of time._

It's what, four, maybe five? God, how can he sit there and sit like some ice statue, his eyes shut against the world? What does he see in his mind?

His power truly scares me. No cat should be like this, able to create a living dead man like the Tugger, or send his mind elsewhere while his body rests on earth. It's not right.

Of course, I don't exactly have much else to rely on, and what can I do? Tell him to get rid of his magic? Even if I dared, he couldn't. Even if he could, he wouldn't! The junkyard cats need it to protect our tribe.

What was it Munkustrap told me? I can't remember, so I merely widen the distance between me and Quaxo, waiting for him to surface again, in the ever brightening daylight.

Six thirty am, by the sound of the traffic, a cacophony of discordant blaring as rush hour swells to its peak. With it, the sunrise has brought an icy wind that pierces my coat and abrades my eyes, making me blink until they burn with tears.

"Autumn comes swift and hard this year."

I don't turn around. My bones ache with the sudden temperature change, and standing or even bending my knees is unthinkable just now.

"Perhaps by October we will see a snowfall." Now I begin to recognize the voice, and I remember how I always thought that Old Gus had the speech of a winter leaf, for his voice is warm and brown, but faded and wrinkled into terminal frailty by untold ages of wear. A voice so familiar and routine is a breath of fresh air in the suffocating crazy world that I feel I now live in. "Perhaps sooner."

"Surely there have been worse autumns?" I do not take my eyes off the patch of ground that has fixated them for the last hour- I know that inch of dirt like my own brother, now.

Behind me, a breath is drawn in heavily. "Some. Yet it is rare to feel the bite of winter at the end of August." Now I let my eyes slip closed, trying to see what his voice paints pictures of. Black and white, faded photographs, of families forcing smiles in front of cameras, in clothes they would never otherwise wear. No one in those pictures wants to be there, they do it for their family. But you can see the family dashing inside and locking the door against screaming blizzards and sleeting rains of ice, or at least I can feel it in his words. The chill of winter cut through fur and threadbare human rags, slicing a creature up right at the heart of his bones. The old moan in bed and the young dash restlessly around the house, drowning themselves in the clamorous cries that they raise. The adults drown sorrows and fears in good warm brandy, and sometimes have a bit too much, and then the house gets scary...

No. No! Why am I so morbid today?

"How long will the winter last, Gus?" Just the polite thing to ask. A long winter will be bad and good for the junkyard- worse for those with no humans or shelter.

"Not so long." His voice rasps and shakes as if his throat is torn. "Not so long. But colder. And there will be storms." And he stands behind me, his statement sitting in the air, a rock of certainty.

What a way to put it. There will be storms.

The junkyard will be buried in snow.

Ice will coat the streets, homeless humans and animals alike will be snuffed silently in the night as Jack Frost exercises his twisted humor.

Strays will hide indoors, huddle together as the devil's cries echo in the wind.

The weak will die.

The frost will kill the mice, the rats, it'll bring new dangers to foraging the dumpsters. What survives will be lean, tough, and nasty.

_There will be storms._

And yet,

(_Alonzo turns around slowly, but Gus is gone with the shift of the breeze, fluttering away like a leaf, searching for a place warmer and nicer than this_)

those who survive will keep surviving

(_his face is weathered and fragile, like his voice, and his fur hangs in tatters from his skin, but he is alive and older than almost any cat in the junkyard_)

and keep surviving, until they are as old leather, drenched and dried in the sun, pale, wrinkled, and finally ready to give life over to the next generation.\

Huh. Life. You'll never get out of it alive.

"_Aufwachen._"

At the whisper, crisp and clean and sudden like a cockroach being stepped upon, I turn to face the magical cat. His dark body was wire-tense with meditation, but now it deflates as he releases a sigh that goes on forever.

"Well?" My immediate life will be shaped by the contents of his report.

"Pretty much everyone's hanging around the junkyard. Of course you know whose in the oven, 'cept they just got joined by Gus, trying to keep warm. The kittens are all with Skimble because the queens are busy, and they're hanging around by the Tire. Old Deuteronomy is sleeping, dunno where his den is, can't tell, but he's fine. Um... Plato and Asparagus are just sort of keeping watch over the entrances and exits for you, though I'm afraid they're keep getting distracted by street queens. Still, they're at their posts. And Dad's at home." With the mention of his father he stops to breathe, then failed at smiling. "Unfortunately, Rumpelteazer's totally erratic- trying to keep track of her progress through the streets is terrible."

My lip hurts from being chewed on so much. "Then let her go for now. If it's a choice between her and the tribe, we have to keep watching the Jellicles."

"For now. That just leaves the Twins, and that's where it gets odd."

"What? Coricopat's right over there, so Tantomile should be too."

I regret my words the instant they leave my lips, partly because of the scared look that flashes in one unguarded instant across his wide eyes. "Well she's not. She's in the streets chasing after someone- 'snot Rumpie, and there's serious bad vibrations coming from her brother. Something isn't right Alonzo."

For a minute I paw idly at the dirt, trying to get past the instinct to say good riddance to the Twins, and focus. After all, they are cats too. Really. Even if she hates me and I hate her. Damn!

"And what about Cassandra?" My ears have been open the entire time for the one name that he hasn't mentioned.

The words come out in a flat hammer blow. "I can't find Cassandra at all."

As sudden, as hard, before I have the chance to react, a terrible scream explodes from the middle of the junkyard, and I am on my feet and running only a fraction before Quaxo.

There, where the scream came from, the male half of the magic Twins lies stiff across the car trunk, fallen backwards with his eyes and mouth still open in a soundless, twisted scream. Others are running over, but I barely take notice, only step away from it, afraid it will move, scared of how its head is turned, staring directly through me.

Quaxo's own scream sounds as if it is filtered through thick veils, veils of blood. Blood from wounds. Wounds etched like gaping death marks across the very, very dead body of Coricopat- Bile rises and heaves itself from me in one motion. Sounds around me suggest that this reaction is not unique to me, though I feel as if it must be. The sour taste stings my mouth; it cakes in the fur of my muzzle as I double over, stomach empty, gasping out dry heaves.

And then I land on my knees and it is over, one more thing on top of everything else.

I must be insane. That's the only answer. All of this has driven me crazy.

I'd like to think that.

I really would.


End file.
